We can learn about historical events and periods, but we will never know what it was like to actually live through them, unless we actually did live through it.
One of my favorite quotes is from William Wordsworth's 'Preface to Lyrical Ballads':
For a multitude of causes, unknown to former times, are now acting with a combined force to blunt the discriminating powers of the mind, and, unfitting it for all voluntary exertion, to reduce it to a state of almost savage torpor. The most effective of these causes are the great national events which are daily taking place, and the increasing accumulation of men in cities, where the uniformity of their occupations produces a craving for extraordinary incident, which the rapid communication of intelligence hourly gratifies. To this tendency of life and manners the literature and theatrical exhibitions of the country have conformed themselves.[1]
It's so interesting because, looking back at the period of time he's talking about, from the 21st century, his time seems so slow and primitive. In our age, through the internet and computer technology, we can and do communicate with anywhere on earth virtually instantaneously. Wordsworth's was the era of the telegraph, the newspaper, and the train.
It's like when you were in primary/ elementary school and you made the jump from 2nd grade to third, so you were no longer an infant, and things got a lot more serious. As an adult you look back on that and remember what it was like but still, compared with other life changes, it's very minor.
[1]
Wordsworth, William, Preface to Lyrical
Ballads, 1800, Bartleby.com, section 8
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